International Trade Law (Economic Theory, Law, and Cases)

Author: Huang Dongli
Publisher:
Publishing Time: Not Available
Features: This book adopts a format different from traditional legal textbooks, using case-based teaching to achieve the primary goal of legal education—training students' logical thinking, analytical, and problem-solving skills. Advanced international teaching experiences have proven that case-based teaching is an effective way to achieve this goal. By combining theory with reality through case-based teaching, it can be a pathway to addressing the issue of graduates being "high in theory but low in practice." Although there are many writings on international trade law and WTO in China, these works either focus on different aspects or have different formats. So far, no book has separated public and private law content while integrating economic theory, law, and case analysis. After a period of teaching practice, I believe it is necessary to have a book that primarily aims to train students' logical thinking and analytical abilities while teaching the public law aspects of international trade law.
This book introduces the content of international trade law in seven parts, following the research characteristics of international trade law and primarily based on the WTO legal system.
Part 1 is the economic theory of international trade law. The international trade law system gradually formed to regulate international trade, with the WTO legal system being its most prominent representation. Therefore, to study international trade law, including the relevant laws of WTO, one must first understand certain economic theories. This part comprehensively introduces the economic theories related to international trade law from three aspects—trade liberalization theory (Chapter 1), trade protectionism theory (Chapter 2), and international trade policy (Chapter 3)—allowing readers to understand the economic theoretical foundation for the formulation of international trade law.
Part 2 is organizational law (Chapter 4), which primarily introduces the organizational law of the most important international trade organization today—the WTO. Through the WTO organizational law, the structure, decision-making mechanisms, and daily operational mechanisms of international trade organizations, as well as the fundamental organizational law content and models of international trade organizations, are presented.
Part 3 is the dispute settlement mechanism (Chapter 5). This is the procedural law content that every legal system includes. Based on the methodology of international dispute settlement mechanisms, this part provides an in-depth introduction to the WTO's dispute settlement mechanism. Under the insistence of developed member countries, this mechanism has maintained most of the characteristics of dispute settlement in international organizations while breaking away from the traditional practices of international law and developing new content in relevant areas of international law. Through legal and case analysis in this part, one can clearly understand the actual operation of the WTO's dispute settlement mechanism and some unique issues it faces.
Part 4 is the substantive law of traditional international trade—goods trade—which includes the fundamental and also the three cornerstones of the WTO: non-discrimination, tariff reductions, and the prohibition of quantitative restrictions. Chapters 6 and 7 provide detailed legal analysis of the numerous issues related to these three important principles through case studies, aiming to fully and accurately reveal their guiding role in practice.
The WTO system is built on a balance of interests among all parties. To maintain this balance, the WTO has formulated relevant exceptions for the above three principles. Chapters 6 and 7 include case studies and legal analysis of these exceptions, while Chapter 8 specifically analyzes general exceptions and security exceptions. Through these analyses, one can better understand how the balance mechanism in the WTO legal system functions.
Additionally, Part 4 also includes two aspects of non-tariff trade barriers: technical regulations and sanitary and phytosanitary measures related to the environment (Chapter 9), as well as three aspects of legal provisions related to agriculture, textiles and clothing, and trade-related investment measures introduced into the multilateral trade system during the Uruguay Round negotiations (Chapter 10 and Chapter 11).
Part 5 is trade remedies. The main trade remedy methods in international trade law are threefold: anti-dumping measures, countervailing measures, and safeguard measures. This part is divided into three chapters (Chapters 12, 13, and 14) to provide theoretical, legal, and case analysis of these three trade remedy measures, demonstrating the practical application of their specific legal provisions.
Parts 6 and 7 provide legal and case analysis of the substantive law provisions in two emerging fields of international trade—the trade-related intellectual property rights and services trade. Due to the increasing impact of intellectual property on international economic development, Part 6 (Chapter 15) provides a detailed case analysis of the legal provisions of the WTO's Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS).
Part 7 on services trade (Chapter 16) is the area with the greatest development potential in the future WTO, and many specific provisions still need to be further clarified and formulated through negotiations among member countries.
Looking at the history of the formation of international trade law, especially the formation process of the WTO legal system, it is not difficult to see that every specific provision in these legal systems is the result of struggles among various interest groups in the international community to protect their own interests. Without a doubt, the two largest interest groups in the WTO system are the developed countries' interest group and the developing countries' interest group. Leveraging their advantages in politics, economy, science, technology, and legal systems, the developed countries' group attempts to permanently maintain their existing and developing interests by formulating international trade rules. Although the development of the world economy has also benefited developing countries, to secure a fair share of the benefits and protect their own development interests, developing countries must participate more actively in the formulation of international trade rules. To achieve this, the first step is to study and research existing rules. This is precisely the author's intention in writing this book.